Has anyone tried to dye a tweed jacket before?

[SWRT]

I'm working on recreating a Matt Smith Doctor costume on the cheap, because
I'm cheap and my wife would get annoyed if I blew a bunch of money on screen
accurate stuff.

I bought one on ebay that has a lot of the same styling ques as this one, but
the color is waaaay too light. I was wondering if anyone has ever tried to dye
a tweed jacket a darker color. What I thought was the flash in the pictures
was just actually the genuine color. Almost an oatmeal. Is there any way to
dye this darker while maintaining the shape and texture of the wool?


Here's what I was going for:


Here's what I got:





I did manage to get a pair of the G-Star Raw Blade pants for $40-something.
I have a copy of the Sonic Screwdriver remote on the way that I'll be modifying
here soon like Kurasawa (hopefully it'll work).
I still need some boots (thinking the Stacey Adams Madison with some acetone)
some suspenders and a bow tie...and a Paul Smith shirt, but I'm hoping I can make
something close when I go to VietNam here soon. Has anyone tried creating a shirt
from fabric off of Spoonflower? None of the fabrics seem to be a good shirt material :/




I did find a pretty close version of his watch that I need to find a Speidel band for:




As you can tell, I have a long way to go and this is actually my first time ever
trying to create a costume so it should be pretty interesting Any help would
be really appreciated. Thanks, guys!

 

[Risu]

I have all the shirt fabrics for sale on Spoonflower and while the cotton poplin is a little heavier than the real shirts, it is a good shirt fabric.

As for the jacket, my first close enough for series 5 was the right weave and cut, but grey. I dyed it in warm water and it worked reasonably well, but destroyed the structure of the jacket. The interfacing separated inside, the shoulder pads swelled, and the whole thing got a little odd in general.

- - - Updated - - -

Just FYI though, that jacket looks like a great color already.

 

[SWRT]

How would I find your fabric pattern on Spoonflower?

That's what I was concerned with :/ Dont know if I should bother then. It looks
a bit lighter in person, but I think it will be close enough for government work.
I was considering getting the shetland tweed fabric used on screen and getting
the jacket made custom while I'm over in VietNam, but it was about $400 something
in material alone so I figured maybe I'll just use this jacket and get the spoonflower
fabric and get a shirt custom made. My only concern with their fabric is washing them.
Not sure how well they'll hold up.

Do you have the patterns for the red and blue and the sleeve patterns?
I'm in-between a medium and small when it comes to shirts so you think
two yards of the main material would be good and a bit less for the sleeves?
I've never had a custom shirt before but I heard it's cheap in VN.

 

[BAK55]

Wool shrinks when it gets wet. I wouldn't recommend attempting to dye the jacket.

 

[Risu]

I'm out of town this weekend and can't link things easily, but I'll send you a pm to link you to the fabrics when I get home on Tuesday. I do have both colors and sleeves. I'm not sure if two yards would get you the whole shirt, I think you'd need three and a fat quarter of the sleeve fabric.

 

[Cameron1138]

If the second picture you posted is what the jacket actually looks like, then I honestly think it'll be fine. It's probably a few shades lighter than Smith's, but it's certainly quite close. I doubt that most people would notice or care.

 

[SWRT]

I'm out of town this weekend and can't link things easily, but I'll send you a pm to link you to the fabrics when I get home on Tuesday. I do have both colors and sleeves. I'm not sure if two yards would get you the whole shirt, I think you'd need three and a fat quarter of the sleeve fabric.

Ah, that would be awesome Thanks!

- - - Updated - - -

It's a bit lighter. I'll have to get a proper picture of it in daylight and post it up on here.
It's not terrible, just not that close either. But you're probably right. I doubt most people
would even care.

 

[SWRT]

Does anyone have a good screen cap of the elbow patches used on the Harris tweed jacket?
Or a source for a good quality set?

Not sure if these were a suede texture or leather.

 

[Risu]

I don't think they're suede. On the Donegal jacket they're a chocolate brown pebble grain cowhide. Never seen a good shot of the elbows on the Harris tweed.

 

[SWRT]

Like these ones?


Unfortunately I could just find a picture. Not a place to purchase them.

 

[Risu]

That's fairly similar to the ones on the Donegal.